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Monday, March 9, 2015

In love with Sherlock and Sir Arthur in "Arthur and George" (Martin Clunes)

NORTHERN ECHO
First published 02:02 Monday 9 March 2015 in Entertainment & Lifestyle

ITVARTHUR & GEORGE EPISODE 3Pictured: MARTIN CLUNES as Arthur AND HATTIE MORAHAN as Jean.These images are the copyright of ITV/DOYLE 2014 LTD. (19965343)

SHE'S due to be seen in a fictional TV adventure with an elderly Sherlock Holmes, played by Sir Ian McKellen, in Mr Holmes, so there's a detecting connection for Hattie Morahan at the moment as millions watch her as the real life Jean Leckie, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's love interest in three-part series Arthur & George.

Morahan admires her character’s patience and fortitude for waiting so long for Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Martin Clunes) to propose marriage.

“I think it must have been very difficult at the time to contend with other people’s gossip and sense of scandal. They had to endure that quite a lot; people making assumptions about the relationship. We still don’t know whether they were utterly platonic before his wife died. To give them the benefit of the doubt, it seems that is what they tried to do. I think there was an awful lot of gossip. When they got married there was a lot of sneering about their relationship. The good thing is that they remained together until he died, and they had children. It was obviously an absolute meeting of souls," says Morahan.

Would the actress have waited that long? “If this is the person you love more than anything else in the world, then what can you do. It is going to make you more miserable walking away from the relationship. There is a moment in the story where we see her reaching the end of her tether, and saying ‘It’s been great, I don’t regret a moment, but I can’t do this any longer’. Her taking that step makes him reconsider his position."